Coachella 2013: Who will stand out in the stream?

April 6, 2013

Updated Aug. 21, 2013 1:17 p.m.

1 of 7

1 of 7

LONDON, ENGLAND - AUGUST 12: Bernard Sumner of New Order performs at BT London Live celebration Concert at Hyde Park on August 12, 2012 in London, England. (Photo by Danny Martindale/Getty Images) Stringer

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA - JANUARY 18: Ezra Koenig of Vampire Weekend performs live on stage at Big Day Out 2013 at Sydney Showground on January 18, 2013 in Sydney, Australia. (Photo by Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images) Stringer

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA - JANUARY 18: Karen O of Yeah Yeah Yeahs performs live on stage at Big Day Out 2013 at Sydney Showground on January 18, 2013 in Sydney, Australia. (Photo by Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images) Stringer

1 of 7

PERTH, AUSTRALIA - FEBRUARY 18: Chali 2na of Jurassic 5 performs at the Perth stop of the Good Vibrations Festival 2007 at the Belvoir Amphitheatre February 18, 2007 in Perth, Australia. Good Vibrations is an annual music festival staged at various Australia cities with natural surroundings as the backdrop for proceedings. (Photo by Paul Kane/Getty Images) *** Local Caption *** Chali 2na Stringer

Let's start with some caveats. Principally: How strong the live stream will be from both Coachella weekends (available on the official site) depends on your equipment as much as the technical competence of festival organizers. Their crews already battle the elements to bring the action home. Don't battle back by having a lousy Internet connection and a shoddy laptop.

Also keep in mind that not everything will air, perhaps including some of these choices. Several top-tier names are apt to deny access.

And don't expect much – or anything – out of the Sahara dance tent. Apparently little was shown from there last year, so we aren't recommending many EDM stars.

Roughly 20 turns get broadcast each day. No telling which ones they will be, but if I were stuck home resting my feet, sipping tea with the A/C cranked, here's who I'd hope to see.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs: Their fourth album, Mosquito, arrives between the fests, so expect a sizable handful of new bits. But there's also wildly colorful fashion to accompany the NYC trio's updated sound, and vocalist Karen O is among the most compulsively watchable figures of the past 10 years. Their hits should wow.

Blur: Only ardent Anglophiles and Brits waking up in the U.K. will care about the Stone Roses. But Blur's equally rare appearance should make for compelling viewing. The proper lineup, fronted by Damon Albarn (better known here via Gorillaz) hasn't played California since 1999; guitarist Graham Coxon had left when a mellower version played Indio in 2003. Never heard more than the woo-hoo of “Song 2”? This set should convince you of what fans have known for years: They always were better than Oasis.

Grinderman: Nick Cave's generous four appearances across both weekends are musts, but his Bad Seeds sets each Sunday may prove challenging to the uninitiated, depending on how much they pull from their tame new disc, Push the Sky Away. This snarling, darkly sexual side project with most of that band is how the Bad Seeds used to be: raw, unfiltered, riveting.

How to Destroy Angels: A question mark we'll know more about after Wednesday's preview in Pomona. Supposedly they come with full-scale spectacle, but will Trent Reznor permit the filming of his new outfit, including wife Mariqueen Maandig and frequent co-composer Atticus Ross? If so, will their atmospherics, demanding on record, have any impact online?

The Shouting Matches: Justin Vernon fuzzing and stomping it up, Black Keys-style, the exact opposite of the falsetto mood-rock he creates as Bon Iver. The best-kept secret of Coachella 2013.

Jurassic 5: Back after six years away, one of the best alternative hip-hop acts to rise out of L.A. in the '90s not only may be the liveliest sight all day, but the finest rap anyone provides all weekend, Wu-Tang Clan included. “Golden” should be just that.

Passion Pit: Widely hailed for last July's Gossamer, these established but not huge dance-pop New Englanders have been building toward a breakout moment. They won't draw like Phoenix in 2010. But they may come close.

Sparks: They were cult heroes in the '70s, minor hitmakers in the '80s, virtually forgotten in the '90s but finally revered by aficionados in the past decade. Now L.A.'s Mael brothers – Ron, who looks like Hitler's lanky offspring, and Russell, the one with the pretty voice – are unveiling their first-ever just-them production after a celebrated European tour. Being band-less, they may come off more intimately online than amid swirls of noise on the polo field.

Foals: I equally want to give this spot to O.C.-linked Local Natives, the Silver Lake outfit whose infectious rhythmic stew ought to be widely digested once again in the desert. But, like Passion Pit, this at times similarly high-pitched English outfit, producing rock grooves almost as feverish as the late LCD Soundsystem's, is primed for something big, despite the occasional weightiness of its new disc, Holy Fire.

Johnny Marr: After stints with Modest Mouse and the Cribs, one of the most distinctive guitarists of the past 30 years has finally stepped into the marquee spotlight with a sharp solo album, The Messenger. More reason to tune in: He’s been performing several Smiths classics that helped seal his reputation, and with New Order also on tap in Indio, a guest vocal from that group’s Bernard Sumner on “Getting Away with It” (recorded in 1991 as Electronic) seems inevitable.

Bernard Sumner with New Order live in Hyde Park last December. Photo: Danny Martindale, Getty Images

APRIL 13 & 20

New Order: Even without the unmistakable imprimatur of bassist Peter Hook, these crucial Brit progressives were glorious at the Greek last October. They owe us a better Coachella set than what they delivered in 2007. Should be a stunner, loaded with classics.

Phoenix: It would have been amazing had this outfit co-headlined with countrymen in Daft Punk. But the French quartet is certain to be the life of the party, anyway. In 2010, it unified the crowd in a massive way from the second stage. This will be huger.

The Postal Service: Arguably the most anticipated set. A decade ago, sonic-shaper Jimmy Tamborello and Death Cab for Cutie's Ben Gibbard concocted a treasured gem, Give Up (returning Tuesday in a deluxe edition), via its chosen moniker. The duo was never together, yet crafted wistfully inventive songs adored by millennials, influencing a generation of synth-pop enthusiasts, Owl City most obviously. The only catch: they rarely performed. Even with Jenny Lewis on backing vocals, how will they sound live?

the xx: Presumably surfacing well after sundown and ideal for in-the-dark entrancing, this English group's electro/organic minimalism threatens to drift into the ether, until the intensity of the playing pulls it back in.

Sigur Rós: See How to Destroy Angels. Will this be the mindblower all convinced fans already think it will be? Some of us may nap. At home, these Icelanders may bring you to rapture. Or at least provide pleasant background ambience.

Franz Ferdinand: These Scots don't do anything different now than they did a decade ago. And so what? They're irresistibly energetic, especially in rapid doses, and their last Coachella set (in 2009) was a blast.

Café Tacuba: They've wowed before, no reason they won't again. El Objeto Antes Llamada Disco, the Mexican band's seventh disc and first in five years, couldn't be more relevant to today's electro-infused scene. And fans get so fired up you can't help but catch the spirit, even from a screen.

Violent Femmes: Beloved for their one-of-a-kind 1983 debut, this trio that was alt-folk before the idea existed has been inactive since 2007, after bassist Brian Ritchie grew so disgusted with their signature song “Blister in the Sun” being used in a Wendy's ad that he sued chief songwriter Gordon Gano for a share of publishing rights. Maybe they all need money and that's why they've buried the hatchet. Regardless, if they're as hearty fun as they used to be, this return could be special.

Janelle Monáe: A fascinating amalgamator on record, she’s even more innovative on stage, capable of getting out-there like Erykah Badu yet retaining spiky James Brown propulsion, and pushing her malleable pipes to the limit in either mode. She’s got another long-gestating album in the works, The Electric Lady. Hopefully she’ll share more of it. At the very least she’ll be androgynously eye-grabbing.

Savages: Far and away the most talked-about act to emerge from Austin's SXSW music conference last month. Will this all-female quartet of neo-Britpunks live up to the hype? We shall see.

Vampire Weekend: What was I saying about Franz Ferdinand being irresistibly energetic? Yeah, like that, times 50. The crowd will go nuts for 'em, no matter what they haven't heard from new album Modern Vampires of the City, which should get a healthy sampling a month before it drops.

Tame Impala: Aussies who for two of the best albums in recent memory have made grippingly neo-psychedelic prog-rock like an uncomplicated, navel-gazing Yes unmoored from mystical fantasy. They were nothing to look at yet totally transcendent last year at the El Rey, where they couldn’t get nearly loud enough. I want ’em My Bloody Valentine loud, obliterating the senses.

Rodriguez: It should be a crowning West Coast moment for the rediscovered Detroit talent, overlooked decades ago but – thanks to stupefying success in South Africa that led to the Oscar-winning documentary Searching for Sugar Man – now celebrated by fans less than half his age. It's as if his career just started at 70, and with Lou Reed off the lineup, he's suddenly the festival's visiting elder.

Social Distortion: How could you not at least peek in on our local heroes? Especially since this isn't really their kind of festival. Curious what size crowd will turn out and how they'll go over with people who don't actively listen to them.

Dead Can Dance: Of all places, the desert – a beautiful but unforgiving and potentially dread-filled setting that this reunited English/Australian duo has evoked numerous times in its music – is the ideal environment for a performance from Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry. Pray it isn't windy, otherwise many tendrils of their sometimes fragile sound may get flattened.

He's playing four times, might as well picture the Aussie twice. Photo: Noel Vasquez, Getty Images

Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds: See Grinderman on Friday. Even if the new stuff doesn't connect, you're still gonna get “Red Right Hand,” “From Her to Eternity” and, if he really wants to take everyone's breath away, “Into My Arms.”

La Roux: More adventurous lovers of electronica-plus-femme-vocals shouldn't miss Grimes, either. But depending on scheduling, the exuberance of vocalist Elly Jackson and her London group has the same high potential for crowd exhilaration as Passion Pit.

OMD: Surface-level acquaintances may write this lot off as synth-pop piffle based solely on “If You Leave” and “So in Love.” They won't know what they're missing. Lively and fundamental like Depeche Mode at its most richly carefree, these reunited Englishmen will have throngs young and old reveling in memories.

The Three O’Clock: How much their jangle still glitters we’ll know after their Glass House warm-up this weekend, and just how many Coachellans will remember them remains to be seen. But these survivors of L.A.’s Paisley Underground – the same scene that spawned the Bangles, the Dream Syndicate and the Plimsouls – made some twee-terrific ’60s-steeped records back in the day. After a quarter-century away, there may never again be reason for them to reunite. See ’em while you can.

Red Hot Chili Peppers: Yes, they're a weak choice. But if you're taking part in the Coachella conversation, you ought to check out a few songs. Don't be surprised if they silence groans with a feisty run of hits packing more heat than overplayed radio counterparts can anymore. They tend to rise to the occasion out there. Or, you know, they'll bore everyone to tears.

Another 10 worth watching: the otherworldly sounds of otherwise static James Blake, the everywhere-at-once kinetics of Robert DeLong, the joy of the Lumineers, whatever Wu-Tang Clan pulls together, dance-punk from the Faint, minimalist holler from Hanni El Khatib, soulful songbird Jessie Ware, the Devo-in-Detroit feel of JEFF the Brotherhood, psych-rockers Thee Oh Sees and the gauzy folk of Father John Misty.

User Agreement

Keep it civil and stay on topic. No profanity, vulgarity, racial
slurs or personal attacks. People who harass others or joke about
tragedies will be blocked. By posting your comment, you agree to
allow Orange County Register Communications, Inc. the right to
republish your name and comment in additional Register publications
without any notification or payment.